Chapter 16 #2
“What?” he interrupts. “When will you be home?” As usual, Robbie sounds like he’s whining.
“Tomorrow morning.”
“Where are you staying?”
“At my boyfriend’s.”
“I didn’t know you had a boyfriend. Are you guys serious?”
“It’s none of your business, Robbie.”
I feel the weight of Drew’s gaze on me. Even though he can only hear my half of the conversation, he’s probably figured out what we’re talking about.
“Jeez, Ally,” Robbie replies. “I’m just trying to be polite.”
Sure he is. “So can you come tomorrow morning?”
“I guess,” he says petulantly. “Eleven okay?”
“Sure,” I say quickly. “Bye, Robbie.”
I tap my phone to end the call and look up to meet Drew’s gaze. “He was calling about the water leak.”
“Right.” Drew’s expression doesn’t give much away, but the implications of that call are hard to miss. It’s Friday evening, and Robbie was clearly angling to come over.
“Robbie’s a pain in the ass, but he’s basically harmless,” I explain.
Drew nods again, but he doesn’t look convinced. “I think I should come with you tomorrow.”
“Oh, I can handle Robbie. He’s around my age, actually. His parents own a bunch of properties in the neighborhood, and they gave him two houses when he turned twenty-one. It spreads out the family income, so they pay less tax.”
“Uh huh,” Drew says. I can tell he’s not that interested in the details of Robbie’s family, or their tax planning. “I’m sure you can handle him on your own, but you shouldn’t have to.”
I don’t reply right away. I’m very tempted to say yes. I can handle Robbie, but it would be nice to have Drew there.
On the other hand, I can’t get used to this. I won’t always have Drew to fight my battles.
“Ally, we’re pretending to be in a relationship,” he points out. “And if we were, there’s no way you’d be dealing with Robbie by yourself.”
“Okay,” I relent, and I see Drew relax. “He’s coming by at eleven tomorrow.”
“Great. We’ll go together.”
When we finish dinner, Drew loads the dishwasher, and I carry the leftovers to the fridge.
The contents of his fridge give me pause. There’s a stack of premade meals in single serving containers, along with a bag of apples, a carton of milk, and cans of Perrier.
Drew catches me staring. “I use a meal delivery service,” he explains. “Premade and microwaveable. They deliver a week at a time.”
“I see. Are they any good?” I peer at the top container, which is labeled ‘duck a l’orange with green beans and rice’.
He shrugs. “They’re not bad, but after a while it all tastes the same. I’m thinking of trying a different company.”
“Hmm.” There are a lot of containers stacked on the shelf, so if they deliver a week at a time . . . “You eat this stuff for both lunch and dinner?”
He nods. “Yeah.”
I stick the leftover Indian food on the shelf and close the fridge. “So you didn’t actually need me to make your lunch.”
“No,” he admits. “But the stuff you made was better than this. And it was nice to have variety.”
“I could start making your lunch again,” I offer. “I make my own anyway, and it’s hardly more work to make two.”
“You don’t have to do that.”
“Drew, we’re pretending to be in a relationship,” I tell him. “And if we were, there’s no way I’d let you eat premade microwaveable food for every meal.” I’m sure he’s buying high end stuff, but the idea is still depressing.
“Well, okay, then,” he agrees. “Would you cook me dinner, too? If we were really in a relationship?”
“Sure. But I’d probably also insist you take your turn in the kitchen.”
He grins. “You might regret that. I’m not much of a cook.”
“That’s what people say when they want an excuse not to cook.”
“In my case, it’s also true,” he says with a shrug. “Do you want to watch more TV?”
I’m about to say yes when I remember he might have other things he wants to do tonight. I don’t want him to feel like he needs to keep me company.
“Actually, I’m pretty exhausted,” I say. “I might head to bed.”
“Are you feeling okay?” Drew’s brow furrows in concern. It’s barely eight o’clock, so it’s a valid question. “Is your arm sore?”
“No. I mean, it aches a little, but it’s fine.”
The line between his eyebrows deepens. “Can I have a look?”
I obligingly hold out my arm, and he takes it in his hands. There’s a gauze dressing over the cut, so there’s not much to see.
“There’s not much redness around it,” he says. “Tomorrow we can take the dressing off to have a better look. We want to make sure it doesn’t get infected.”
“Do you fuss like this over all your patients?” I tease.
He rolls his eyes and lets go of my arm. “I never fuss, Ally.”
“If you say so.” My sentence ends on a yawn; I wasn’t lying about being exhausted.
Drew chuckles. “Bedtime, huh?”
“It’s been a long day.”
He nods. “Good night, then.”
“Night, Drew.”
I head to the bathroom and brush my teeth, then change into Drew’s T-shirt. It’s loose on me, falling to mid-thigh, and wonderfully comfortable.
Then I stretch out on the bed with a Lincoln Lawyer novel from Drew’s bookshelf. For a pull-out, this bed is wonderfully comfortable. The mattress is better than the one I have at home, which I bought on clearance at Wal-Mart.
Five minutes later, I hear footsteps in the hallway, and there’s a soft knock at the door.
“Hey, Drew,” I say, pulling the door open.
“Sorry to bother you,” he says awkwardly. “I realized my laptop’s still on the desk, and I wondered if you’d mind—”
“Of course.” I grab the laptop and charging cable and carry them back to Drew, who never moves from the doorway.
“Thanks,” he says as I hand them to him. “Sleep well, Ally.”
“You too.”